


War For The Playground

by WrittenInCinnamon



Category: Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Children, Alternate Universe - Human, F/M, Feels, Fluff and Humor, Gen, Minor Injuries, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Rating May Change, no beta we die like optimus
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-04
Updated: 2021-01-14
Packaged: 2021-03-15 03:47:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,096
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28557105
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WrittenInCinnamon/pseuds/WrittenInCinnamon
Summary: An alternate universe in which The War between the Autobots and Decepticons is a roleplay game between kids of a relatively small town.
Relationships: Elita One/Optimus Prime, Minor or Background Relationship(s)
Comments: 16
Kudos: 34





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Please be aware that the character tags and additional tags and I'm quite sure even relationship tags WILL change. Just will add as I go, to prevent people being disappointed when they click with expectations and the idea they wanted to see isn't in the story yet. So yeah. I MIGHT get to some angst and/or more touchy themes and if I do I will change the rating to T.
> 
> Now that that's out of the way, enjoy! ^^

"Decepticons," Megatron, their leader, spoke. "My Third-In-Command here had gathered that the Autobots are planning an attack tommorow afternoon."

"Oh no!" exclaimed one of the Elite Trine.

"Yes, Skywarp," he reconfirmed. "We need to do all we can to stop them!"

"How do you propose we supress their attack, my Lord?" Starscream asked, the title coming out more like a sarcastic sneer.

"They will most likely come from the north," Megatron explained while pointing to the map on the middle of their meeting table. "So, naturally-"

Suddenly, the door to the basement opened, daylight from the outside spilling in.

"Oh, there you are, boys," a slim, brown-skinned woman with a neatly tied bun of black hair said as she looked over the gathering. "TC, are you playing with your brothers' friends again?"

"Mom-" the teen in question tried, but was cut off.

"You're 14 now, almost 15. It's nice you're spending time with your siblings, but I really think it's time you start acting your age and around people your age. I'm just worried for you, dear."

Ted-Charles, or TC as he was called by everyone, really tried to ignore the younger part of the groups' (plus his brother's) snickers with every ounce of his being. "Mom, I really don't feel like this is stunting my maturity in any way." he argued.

"Yeah!" the youngest of the woman's three sons exclaimed. "Besides, TC has no friends his age!"

"While hilarious," the middle brother snickered once again. "You just made everything worse, Willy."

"Hey, we're at a Decepticon meeting! You're supposed to call me Skywarp here."

"You just called TC by his real name!" came the counter-argument and the teenager in question pulled the two away from eachother before someone breaks the other's nose. 

"Can we talk about this later? Please?" he asked his mother, trying to pull off The Look, which their youngest loved to abuse.

The woman sighed and shook her head with a resihned smile. "Alright, TC."

And with that, the intruding adult left, closing the door, letting purple neon bracelets' lights give off the mysterious glow once again.

"Why do you two argue over every single thing?" Shockwave- or rather Shawn, since this was referncing out-of-roleplay stuff, asked.

"Because I'm better than him, duh," Stephen, the middle brother of the 'Elite Trine' stated like this was the most obvious thing in the world.

"What!? That's not true!" William protested.

"The true anwser is that it's because they're both idiots," TC deadpanned, shutting up the two. Being the oldest had its perks sometimes.

"Ekhem," Maxton intoned, trying to get their attention. "The Autobots?"

"Yes, Lord Megatron," they all replied in sync.

"So, since, as I was saying, Soundwave overheard Wheeljack and Bulkhead in the second floor bathroom, talking about how they're gonna overtake our ground tommorow afternoon," their chosen leader went back to the point. "We obviously need to be prepared. They can only attack from the north, so we will set a border patrol. Elie Trine," he called out. "You will be guarding the big playground, as it's the most desired area."

"What, no, that's boring-"

"Starscream!" Megatron cut off his Second-In-Command. "That's not even an argument."

When said boy only pouted with crossed arms in response, the leader continued. "We'll put Soundwave, Rumble and Frenzy on the sidelines, while me and Blitzwing will roam around our grounds to make sure no one had sneaked through."

"But what about this path over here?" Thundercracker asked, pointing to a spot on the edge of the map. "Three people can't possible cover that much territory and this is fairly passable." 

There was a minute of intense silence as everyone was racking their brains.

"Oh, I know!" Shockwave suddenly exclaimed, his glasses almost falling off his nose with the force of him getting up from the chair. "We will need alot of red-painted rocks and/or red lego pieces..."

\---

"Those 'Cons won't know what hit 'em!" Bulkhead whispered excitedly to his partner on the mission.

"Hell yeah!" Wheeljack replied. "No doubt ol' Buckethead forgot to cover-"

They suddenly stopped as they saw the whole span of the small forest path drowned in red legos, red rocks, red candy wrappers and just all kinds of red things. And sitting cross-legged on the other side was a small, black-haired girl in a white dress with red floral patterns.

"This is a lava pit!" the girl shouted with a pleased grin. "You can't step on it."

"Ah, crap," the chubby boy in a green hoodie muttered.

"Hey, there, uh," Wheeljack tried awkwardly. "You're Soundwave's sister, yeah? Lily-?"

"It's Laserbeak!" she exclaimed pointing to herself dramatically.

"Ok, Laserbeak," he continued, putting his hands up platacingly. They had agreed 8 is the minimum age to participate in the game, but he supposed the girl wasn't fighting them so it didn't count as cheating? Maybe? "How about you let us pass?"

"No."

"I'll give you a piece of chocolate?" Wheeljack tried to bargain.

"Mmmmm," she looked torn for a moment. However, her face hardened with resolve and she exclaimed "No! I'm loyal to my brothers! To the Decepticons!"

Wheeljack sighed. So much for their newfound breach in enemy defenses. "Come on, Bulkhead, we gotta retreat," he said and waved his best friend over.

They traveled back to the Autobot HQ pouting that afternoon.


	2. Chapter 2

"Hi, guys," Bulkhead called, climbing up the ladder.

"You guys are late," Prowl pointed out looking at the two arriving boys with narrowed eyes.

"Sorry man," the other kid, Wheeljack, replied. "We were trying to sneak up on the 'Cons."

"An unapproved attack?" Jazz, the oldest of them, quirked an eyebrow. "Bold of you."

"Heck yeah it is!" Bulkhead agreed.

Prowl looked like he was about to say something, but he just rubbed his face with those pale hands and sighed in defeat. They will sooner all pass their grade with straight As than these two will stop going off to do their own thing.

"Did you succeed though?" Optimus asked, straight to the point.

"Uh, no," the boy dressed in green said bashfully, waving the pitifully unattached to a point red flag.

"They set up a lava pit on the path we wanted to use," Wheeljack added.

"Shame," Cliffjumper sighed and pouted, crossing his arms.

"Ugh," one of the two girls in their club groaned, rolling her eyes. "Why are we talking about the stupid 'Cons. Let's rather talk about us. Look, I made something!" she said, a hint of excitement bleeding into her voice. She crouched to her blue backpack and recovered from its depths a folded sheet of white-ish material.

"What is it, Arcee?" Optimus asked, already curious.

"Ta-da!" she said as she let the sheet unfold. It was a banner with their red logo sewn carefully onto the middle.

"That's awesome!" Bulkhead exclaimed excitedly.

"Good job," praised Ironhide, to which Ratchet nodded in agreement.

"We should hang it under the window," their leader proposed.

"Totally," the 12-year-old girl agreed. "But first," she added with a smirk and pulled out a collection of colorful gel pens. She looked everyone in the eyes before picking up the pink one and writing 'Arcee' on the blank space of the banner.

"Yes, that's such a cool idea!" Bumblebee exclaimed, bouncing on his feet.

Not too long after, there were twelve codenames written on the banner: Optimus, Ratchet, Elita, Jazz, Ironhide, Prowl, Wheeljack, Bulkhead, Arcee, Ultramagnus, Bumblebee and Cliffjumper. 

"Let's put it on the window that you can see Optimus' house from," Elita proposed.

"You've got it, girl," Jazz said and waved over Ironhide.

The two oldest boys took one end of the material respectively and leaned out of the east window of the Autobot treehouse. Wheeljack was still impressed about how Optimus' and Ratchet's dads made it big and stable enough to fit 12 kids without much issue.

They hanged the banner, their HQ now proudly displaying their symbol and squad. Decepticons could only dream of such a cool thing!

"Ha!" Bulkhead exclaimed. "If that doesn't motivate to make an all-out attack on 'Con territory, I don't know what does."

"I am afraid we can't launch an attack straight up tommorow though," Optimus trailed off.

"What, why's that?" Cliffjumper asked, disappointment clear as day in the young boy's voice.

"Me, Elizabeth and Ron have an important math test in two days," he replied sheepishly, shifting out of character briefly.

"Oh come on!" Bulkhead groaned.

"There are more important things than play," Percy, the local fun police sighed. "Especially at 13, I assume."

"I mean," Justin chipped in. "It is when school really picks up. But I'm sure you'll manage, eh?"

"We'll be in your grade in no time," Elizabeth smirked challengingly (as she did everything.)

"Too bad I'll be another grade ahead by then," the older boy gave a smirk of his own.

They left for their respective houses after another hour of light games and chatting, looking at the new banner on their treehouse with a smile pushing itself onto their faces.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Is this treehouse probably unrealistic? Yes. Do I care? Nope. I always wanted a treehouse as a kid, so the 'Bots will have a slagging treehouse, alright!
> 
> Oh and I hope I'm not doing a bad job of it being clear who has what human name... I tried to make them start with the same letter as their bog counterpart do it's not too hard to guess. Just in case, I'll write them down now!  
> Ariana - Arcee  
> Blitzwing - Ludwig (the only name that isn't on the same letter as the bot name)  
> Bulkhead - Bob  
> Bumblebee- Ben  
> Cliffjumper - Clay  
> Elita - Elizabeth  
> Frenzy - Fred  
> Ian - Ironhide  
> Justin - Jazz  
> Laserbeak - Lily  
> Megatron - Maxton  
> Optimus - Oliver  
> Prowl - Percy  
> Ratchet - Ron  
> Rumble - Roman  
> Shockwave - Shawn  
> Skywarp - William  
> Soundwave- Simon  
> Starscream - Stephen  
> Thundercracker- TC (or Ted-Charles)  
> Ultramagnus - Michael  
> Wheeljack - Jack (surprisingly this wasn't the easiest one. I was torn between William and Jack)
> 
> The FBI agent might be confused wtf I was doing searching for 20 names for boys lmao
> 
> Anyway, thanks for all the positivity and hope it continues to be cute and entertaining to you!


	3. SCIENCE!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There aren't too many mentions of their mech names in this chapter so just saying the most important two for this chapter here, in case you don't remember them too well yet-  
> Jack = Wheeljack  
> Stephen = Starscream

"Alright, class," Mrs. Solus said. "For our next lesson, you will have to make a project about one of the topics we've been discussing this year."

A collection of groans and sighs was the response from her ever-enthusiastic 12-year-olds. 

"You're gonna do it in pairs," she continued, earning herself more discontent noises. "And I will choose who's with who." That was a final nail in the coffin and it was tempting Jack to ask if he can change class.

Although not all hope was lost, maybe he will get paired with Bob and the task will be a bit more tolerable? Or maybe, just maybe, he'll get lucky and have an excuse to spend the afternoon with Wendy? He crossed his fingers, hoping for one of the two.

"Alright, first pair will be Matthew and Ariana," their science teacher called out and an unmistakable sound of the girl's forehead hitting the table could be heard. "Then Bob and Percy," the two seemed fine with it. They were friends afterall, even if the latter could be annoying when not going by the book rntered the chat. "Maxton and Wendy." Seriously? One of the only guys who wasn't into that girl got to spend time with her? Come on! 

He almost zoned out with his musings about that, were it not for Mrs. Solus calling out his name "Jack and Stephen."

He froze and turned around to the boy two benches behind him. He looked just as upset about this, pretty much pouting with his arms crossed. No matter how much his face screamed 'this is unacceptable' though, the verdict has already been made. He was stuck doing a project with the Second-In-Command of the Decepticons and spoiled prince of his class, Stephen.

\---

After their last lesson, Jack pretty much rushed after his unwanted teammate, seeing the boy did not bother to wait for him.

He almost crashed into him. Key-word: almost, because Stephen side-stepped at the very last moment.

There was a moment of awkward silence between them as his blue eyes met the other boys brown ones.

"You do realise I was going to wait for you outside, right?" the other boy finally said, eyebrow raised.

"I, uh, yeah," Jack stammered, not having thought of that in actuality. "We going over to your place or?"

"Do you want to walk on your toes at all times?" Stephen inquiered. "Because there's a 100% chance Willy will see 'having pranked an Autobot' and 'having pranked an older kid' as a bragging right."

"Right," the blue-eyed kid acknowledged awkwardly. "So tell your parents you'll be over at mine."

"Already told TC to tell them," the other responded, a smug smirk blossoming on his lips, almost like he wanted to rub his preparedness in Jack's face. Which, in all likelihood, was probably the point.

"Alright, let's go then," he called awkwardly and began leading the way towards his home.

\---

"Hey, mom," he greeted as he opened the door to his family's apartment. He could see Stephen lurking curiously in from the corner of his eye.

"Hello, Jackie," the plump, brown-haired woman replied as she peeked into the main hall from the kitchen.

"I brought a, uh," he said as he meet the other boy's eyes awkwardly. "friend. We have to do a project for science class."

"I see," his mother acknowledged. "Nice to have you..." she said, trailing off in a way that prompted the brown-skinned boy to introduce himself. 

"Stephen," he replied shortly.

"Stephen. Nice name," she complimented before turning back to the kitchen, probably to finish preparing today's dinner. "If you boys are thirsty, tell me. I'll make you some tea." And with that, they were semi-alone again.

Jack led them to his room.

He was hyperaware of the mess in his room and all the nerdy stuff between it. Like the figurines on his desk. Hell, he had a poster depicting his favourite anime girl on his wall. With Stephen seeing all this, he'll probably be the laughing stock for the next month-

"Seriously, Miko Nakadai?" yep, here it comes, he'll be called a nerd or a weeb or both and- "She's hardly the character most worth havjng a poster of."

Wait, what?

"What do ya mean?" Jack asked carefully.

"Raf was obviously the best character of Heroes Prime," Stephen explained like it was the obvious thing in the World.

Dear God, was he into the show as well?

"Really? I thought you would appreciate flying as the siperior superpower over technokinesis," he tried to sound casual.

"Well of course flying is a cool superpower," the brown-eyed boy stated. "But the character herself isn't likeable at all! She's obnoxious, irresponsible and sticks her nose where it isn't needed, like, all the time."

Oh boy, he really was into the show!

"I didn't know you watched anime," Jack pointed out carefully.

"Yeah, I do," Stephen admitted, avoiding eye contact carefully. Seems like he was slightly embarrassed by that fact, too.

There was an awkward pause between them and the blue-eyed boy swore he saw his guest about to go bsck to business, before he decided to risk it and ask "Well, why do you like Raf better?"

It didn't take long for them to ease into a discussion of their apparently shared favourite superhero anime. It felt strange, talking so casually with Stephen. He usually either poked fun at the boy's spoilt nature or saw him as a rival due to their opposing factions. But right now he was, actually, quite tolerable.

"You know," he voiced his thoughts. "It feels so weird being friendly with you. We don't talk much out of play, and in play we're supposed to be enemies."

The brown-eyed boy hummed in response, before straightening his back dramatically and giving his voice a more sly tone as he said "It is I, Starscream, the rightful leader of the Decepticons! I have sneaked into your secret lab, Autobot Wheeljack, to strike a deal with you."

He paced with a devilush smirk. Starscream was very much in-character. "I am planning to make a device that will kill Megatron. Will you help me?" he said menacingly, stretching out a hand for him to shake.

"Yes," he replied after a stunned pause and took the enemy commander's hand. "Let's do that, Starscream."

"Excellent!" he exclaimed and pulled his hand away, relaxing slightly, suggesting he's back to being Stephen. 

They turned to actually doing their project. It was supposed to be poster explaining a chosen topic they talked about this year. They had agreed they're going with the chapter about atoms without argument.

It didn't take long for them to decide they aren't going for a boring A3 paper with blocks of text and some schematics glued to it.

"We need to make an identical circle on the inner side," Stephen pointed out as he was sketching with a pencil on their bright red paper.

"No, it'll be smaller, since the nucleus is way smaller than the whole atom," Jack countered.

The brown-eyed boy stopped for a second, then muttered "Damn, you're right," and prompty started changing his sketch.

What was nice, was that they took creative decisions together. They both enthusiastically proposed ideas, yet didn't shut eachother down. 

There was just this... excitement while they worked. Like they both cared about making it the best it can be. Not for the sake of a good grade even, but for the fun of it.

"So what do you think?" Jack asked as they looked at the finished product.

"It's perfect," Stephen said, a pleased smirk on his face. He then crouched to his yellow backpack, pulling out his hoodir, a sign he's reaadying to leave.

"Hey," he called as the realization hit him. "It was kind of fun, ya know," he paused as their eyes met awkwardly. "Fun. To do this with you."

"Yeah," the other boy replied after an unsure pause of his own. "You're fun to do projects with, gotta admit."

"It's weird," the blue-eyed kid continued. "When we mostly interact during our war game, we don't exactly try to befriend the other group, do we?" he asked, and when his question was met with contemplative silence, he took a step further and added "We could arrange a shared play date sometime and instead of robot civil war, we could do, I don't know, robots versus aliens, or something?"

The chocolate eyes met his for a few seconds and he swore it meant that his guest liked the idea at least to skme degree. But alas, "It wouldn't work," Stephen stated. "You know Maxton doesn't want to spend too much time with Oliver after what happened between them."

"That sucks," Jack murmured, his arms crossed. He liked his play idea, certainly. Like, how cool would robots versus aliens be!

"Scientist Wheeljack," Starscream said, the villain-ish tone back on. "To achieve peace, we need mighty Megatron dethroned! You clearly realise that, don't you?" he said, pacing with his back straight, chin high, steps theatrical. "I, Lord Starscream, shall rule the Decepticons and make the crazed warlord see reason!"

He posed dramatically in front of the window, blocking off the sunlight in a climactic way. It wasn't hard to imagine spread wings amplifying the effect. "Will you swear to secrecy from the 'Cons on my plan?"

"Ya bet, seeker," Wheeljack replied, offering the enemh commander a hand to shake. "Til all are one."

"Til all are one" Starscream replied as he took the Autobot's hand.

\---

"Thank you, Bob, Percy, your presentation was quite good," Mrs. Solus said, gesturing to the boring-ass poster with a few blocks of text and schematics of various parts of a plant next to them.

"Next up," she continued as the two boys went back to their seats. "Jack and Stephen."

The two called out stood up wordlessly, the former carrying their work. He showed to the class what appeared to be a red paper with a blue marble drawn on the middle of it.

"In 5th century b.c.e," Stephen began, making sure to eye contact everyone as he spoke. "Democritus of Abdera coined the term 'atom'. It was supposed to refer to basic building blocks of the universe. The word literally means in greek 'indivisible'."

"Fast forward a few thousand years," Jack continued after his partner. "And humans have identified about a hundread kinds of those, like oxygen, iron or chlorine."

"But wait!" the brown-eyed boy said dramatically, proceeding to unfold the poster like a double-door, revealing a drawing of a model of an atom with texts on the sides that point to various elements of the picture. "There's more."

"Turns out, Democritus could not have been more wrong when assuming atoms are indivisible," Jack continued. "In 1911 it was discovered that atoms are made up of smaller parts - protons, neutrons and electrons..."

\---

"Bro," said Bob to him after class. "You made such a cool presentation with Stephen of all people?"

"Yeah," Jack replied, packing up his backpack absent-mindedly. "Turns out he's not so bad when he wants to be."

"Huh," the boy in a green sweater mused. "Who knew."

"Yeah, the more you know," he said casually. The thought that not everyone who looks uncool is actually uncool bouncing around in his head. Like, it sounds obvious, but somehow it wasn't.

"Wanna go for the swings?" Bob asked, the previous topic already dismissed.

"Heck yeah!" Jack exclaimed. And so, they went to continue having their fun.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Starscream sometimes reminds me of Heather Chandler. Probably something about being an ass alot, but still being hella entertaining. I tell you, TC here probably let Stephen watch Heathers and regrets that choice ever since lol. How does TC know it? I'm pretty sure a humanized TC would be into that kind of stuff- you know, novels, TV dramas and, of course, musicals. I'm heavily debating making him write fanfiction xD
> 
> I suppose this fic is not action-based so far, but the truth is, I'm bad at writing action, I'm pretty sure. So, like, I'm doing fluffy character interactions instead. But there'll be action (as in, their actual game) at some point too, I swear-! I just need to work on it way more than on this.
> 
> Oh, also, I really like Wheeljack & Starscream as a duo, but sadly it only makes sense in IDW or pre-war G1. Welp, not anymore! In this setting, where the war is a game, they can all be friends if I so desire >:3
> 
> (And yes, Wendy is totally Windblade. She's the Pretty Girl(TM) but also uninterested in 90% of her idiot classmates.)


	4. Loosen Up

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WARNING: This chapter contains a brief description of injury. It's not graphic per se and I myself did not find it distressing beyond plot tension, but I tagged this as 'General Audiences' so here's a heads up!
> 
> Oh and there's feels so yeah.

Optimus Prime barely dodged a well-aimed tackle from the enemy Second-In-Command. 

The seeker was merciless in battle, not giving his opponents a moment to recover unless they want to end up offlined in the mud. The Autobot leader quickly recovered and anticipated the next blow, blocking it in time. 

They stared into eachother's optics as they each tried to push the other onto the ground.

"This is your end, Autobot scum!" the 'Con snarled. "The Decepticons will govern the robot population from now on!"

Optimus tried harder to tackle the shorter enemy while thinking of a retort-

When suddenly, a pained, distinctly not-faked shout stopped his train of thought.

The boy he's been wrestling with froze for a split second, before forcefully pulling away, with what could almost be interpreted as... panic on his features.

He followed Stephen's gaze to see the little William kneeling in the mud with pained whimpers, Clay stanfing over him kind of frozen with a thick stick in hand.

For a terrifying moment, the hurt child held a hamd over the right side of his face, with a hint of blood on his palm.

His eldest brother, probably one of the most mature people present, ran over to his sibling's side and said something in a too soft tone for Oliver to pick up from this far away.

The teen gently pulled William's hands away to reveal a bleeding cut over the boy's eyebrow.

He could see the middle brother briefly exhale in relief, before his shoulders stiffened and he all but shrieked "Are you brain-dead!?"

The pre-teen stomped, his brown eyes seemingly trying to prove to the offender looks can actually kill. 

Clay looked stunned as the pissed boy stepped intently into his personal space. "You hit him in the face with a sharp stick, you dim-wit!" he spelled it out in case anyone hadn't caught on and shoved the younger kid rather strongly and not in the previous playful manner either.

That's when Oliver regained the sense to move his legs and run up to pull the two away from eachother before any of the. (particularly the bigger and stronger one) decided to throw any punches.

"He hurt my brother!" Stephen protested. "Let me show him-!"

"That is quite enough," Oliver said sternly.

"Ugh!" the 12-year-old groaned and pulled himself free of the older boy's hold. He then quietly walked over to his brothers and asked in a more normal tone "You okay, Willy?"

William, currently wrapped in TC's protective arms, only gave a single sniff in response.

"Let's get him home," the eldest brother sighed and got up, not letting go of the boy's hand. "Sorry, guys," he said half-heartedly to everyone else and started walking off. Stephen followed and only briefly paused to throw an offensive gesture in Clay's direction before catching up to his kin.

There was an awkward silence. Noone dared to move an inch from where they stood during the incident.

"You should've been more careful," Oliver said with the best 'disappointed parent' face he could pull off.

"It was an accident!" the boy in red shirt exclaimed.

"Which is why you should've been more careful," the older boy repeates sternly.

As the kid pouted stubbornly, Oliver just felt himself grow more tired by the second.

\---

The bell rang to signal the end of the last lesson for the 7th-graders.

Oliver got up and packed up his stuff tiredly. He wasn't really in the mood for... anything right now. His teacher returned him his english test with a big, red F on it, he couldn't sleep well last night and the shitstorm with Clay hitting William in the face from yesterday. Simply, too much.

"Why the sad face?" Elizabeth chipped in as they left the building.

"I just..." the boy sighed. "I don't feel like meeting up with the 'Bots today."

There was a moment of silence before the girl said "Then don't," as if it was the most obvious thing in the World.

"It is my treehouse though," the boy pointed out.

"It's also Ron's and Michael's treehouse," she shrugged. "Come on, we'll have fun without them. Come over to my place?"

Oliver didn't know why the proposition made him smile so easily, yet it did. "Sure," he replied nonchalantly. 

\---

Elizabeth threw her backpack carelessly onto the floor of her room, while Oliver put his own down carefully.

"So," the boy said awkwardly. "What do you want to do?"

"Hmm," she stopped and considered her options. They could put on a CD and watch a movie on her dad's PC, if he allowed it. But that'd be too passive, she wanted to do something wild! Maybe they could play soccer in her backyard? Oh, or maybe "Karaoke?" she proposed.

"Huh?" Oliver intelligently replied, seemingly awkward with the idea.

"Come on, it'll be fun," she said as she walked over to her stack of music CDs next to her player. She picked her favourite one and plucked it into the machine.

Rock music filled the room and she tapped her foot to the rythm.

"Eli-" the boy started, but she cut him off, following the CD's lead.

"Rising up," sha sang, without paying much attention to the quality of her voice, really. "Back on the street, did my time, took my chances."

She grabbed a stray hairbrush from her dresser and pretended if to be a microphone as she continued "went the distance, now I'm back on my feet, just a man and his will to survive."

She pointed the pseudo-mic to her guest's face, knowing for a fact he knows this song.

"So many times," he more recited than sang, it was so hesitant. "It happens too fast, you change your passion for glory." He made eye contact with her and she just nodded encouragingly. "Don't lose your grip on the dreams of the past, you must fight just to keep them alive."

She then threw an arm around his shoulders as she joined him on the refrain. "It's the," they went a bit louder together. "Eye of the tiger, it's the thrill of the fight." Her bright blue eyes met his grayish-blue ones as her expression of confidence was finally relfected in his. "Rising up to the challenhe of our rivals," they continued. "And the last known survivor stalks his prey in the night, and he's watching us all with the eye," they crescendoed and Elizabeth actually started playing an air guitar. "Of the tiger."

They continued the song, going more and more wild with the overblown band parody, her going as far as lying down on the floor, pretending to scream to the microphone.

They could hardly stop themselves from giggling.

They both lied down on the messy floor and caught their breath as the song faded out.

"Okay," Oliver finally said. "I must admit, this was pretty fun."

"You know what else is fun?" she huffed and there was only a second between that and her throwing herself onto the boy and assaulting his ribs with tickles.

He immadiently burst out with laughter qnd tried to get her off, but she did not relent. That is, until he reached her thighs qnd started tickling in return.

Soon, they were a laughing, breathless mess rolling on the floor.

It ended with the boy surrendering, choking out "Okay, okay, I give up," in-between laughs.

And thus, they took another breather, an uninterupted one this time. The two just sat on the girl's bed in a comfortable silence. 

"Jeez, Ellie," the boy sighed. "You always manage to cheer me up somehow, you know?"

"You're welcome," she replied smugly. "Now, why did you need cheering up? Did you get a bad grade from that english test? You can always rewrite that, you know?" she threw it out there casually.

"It's not just that," he murmured. 

"Then what, Oliver?"

Said boy looked away ftom her, suddenly deciding the plain, white ceilling is very interesting.

"Well," he began hesitantly. "You know I like all our younger friends, right?"

"Obviously," she stated matter-of-factly.

"Yep," he trailed off a bit before continuing. "I just sometimes, when they do something stupid, I feel responsible. That I didn't point out something that seemed obvious to me, but apparently wasn't."

She looked at him, her blue eyes wide with surprise. "You're not blaming yourself for Clay being an idiot yesterday, are you?"

"Maybe," he muttered.

"Dude," she said sternly, standing up to put herself directly in her friend's view. "Him being irresponsible is not your fault. It's not like you told him to do it. Hell, you're not even the oldest of our group. Or his family, that's Barry." She looked directly into his tired eyes. "You are responsible only for your own actions. And that's it." When he still looked unsure, she added "Even Screamer didn't blame you, only Clay, and he's a known asshole."

The boy sighed and slowly admitted "Maybe you're right."

"Damn right I am," she said and plopped back down onto the bed.

Contemplative silence fell for a moment, before the boy said with a soft voice "You always have my good in mind."

Elizabeth had no idea how to respond to this statement, so she stayed quiet. He kept talking. "You're really good at keeping me happy. In fact, when we spend time together, I always feel a bit better."

She had no idea where this was going. This was weird. He never said things like that, he rarely admitted to happiness, or any strong emotion at all for that matter.

"Ellie," he called out by a nickname. "Will you be my girlfriend?"

The red-head girl thought that if she for real was a robot, her processor would come with a system32 error message right about now. He proposed her what??

...Well, he was kind. And pretty. And she knew he wouldn't dump her for no reason, Oliver wasn't that kind of guy. She looked at his slightly pleading expression-

"Sure," she said. "We can try, yes."

She put her hand on top of his when her eyes met those kind, soft, grayish-blue ones.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So you know how in TFPrime fanfics people often make Starscream's motive to kill Cliffjumper be revenge for his suspiciously missing trine? Welp, here's a relfection of that, kinda, since I like that trope(?) Is it too obvious I'm not a fan of Cliffjumper-?
> 
> In any case, as I expected, I couldn't last four chapters without SOME angst lol. Then again, long-term stories need conflict, right? Conflict means bad stuff happens, which means characters are upset, which means angst. Then again, with the kinds of ideas for later chapters I have, I might need to bump up the rating to Teen And Up at some point...
> 
> As for Elita x OP, you can notice I didn't give them a grand romantic kiss scene. That's on purpose, really. The reason? Well, they're 13. They only a year or two ago entered the age where "having a boyfriend/girlfriend" means something. And maybe it's just my ace-ness shining through, but I'm pretty sure they still don't have any, uhm, tension of that kind between them. So if you want them to make out, sorry, no. It'd be mostly holding hands, hugs, and maybe an innocent kiss here and there, in the background. To those who don't really like the pairing: it won't really come up too much. I only tagged it out of principle, to be honest. All pairings that might be in this fic will be a background thing, actually.
> 
> Oh, and the song they had sung is Eye Of The Tiger.
> 
> Hope you enjoyed! It's a bit of a tonal shift from the previous ones, I know, but it's still mostly fluff...

**Author's Note:**

> So in case you wondered, most characters are around 12 years old. That bunch includes (at the time of writing this note) Starscream, Soundwave, Wheeljack, Bulkhead, Shockwave, Arcee and Prowl. Megs is supposed to be 13, but is still in that bunch's school grade. The oldest characters who aren't adults are 14, while Laserbesk is the youngest and 6.
> 
> Anyway, I hope you enjoy this little idea! It refused to leave my head for 2 months so here we are lol


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